Another year of booming sales for Orri tangerine

The Orri tangerine has seen its sales volume increase by up to 54% since its regularisation by The Enforcement Organization, S.L. (TEO), master licensee of the variety in Spain and Portugal. In its fifth season, more than 57,000 tons of Orri tangerines have been marketed, thus exceeding the forecasts for the 2019-2020 season and maintaining the trend of previous seasons that place this variety as “the best priced on the market” for the fifth consecutive year, reaching an average price per kilo of €1.15 in the field. The main growing province of Orri was Huelva (31.1%), followed by Valencia (21%), Murcia (18.7%), Almería (9.1%), Castellón (7.9%), Alicante (7.3%) and Seville (4.9%).

This has been a very unusual campaign marked by the increase in demand for citrus, largely motivated by concerns about Covid-19 and these fruits’ vitamin C content which can improve the immune system. At the same time, there has been a 28.9% fall in Spain’s production of tangerines compared to 2018/19, meaning that this has been one of the fastest and shortest campaigns on record.

“Despite the drop in prices in 2019 and the storms that devastated some areas of the Valencian coast at the beginning of the year, the pandemic caused by the coronavirus has benefited not only citrus, but local agriculture in general, and this has led to an acceleration in demand with very good results for citrus growers,” said Guillermo Soler, manager of ORC.

Recognition of the Orri tangerine has soared both in the productive sector and at the consumer level, thanks to its excellent organoleptic qualities, its ease of peeling and its healthy attributes, as well as its extraordinary natural shelf life, which facilitates exportation to multiple markets and reduces food waste.

Photo: Orri Running Committee